We went to Méribel in February for a week skiing. It is a resort in the French Alps about halfway between Grenoble and the Italian border. Last winter was not a great year for snow, but it snowed heavily just before we arrived and there was lots of fresh powder. The entire week until the last day was clear blue skies.

At 2275 m on the Col des Lozes between Méribel and Coucheval

Looking down towards Méribel village in the valley. We could ski from here down to the door of our hotel.

We were skiing on one day with eagles,owls and a condor. One large eagle, 2m wingspan, was flying down the piste with us. It was just behind Alex some of the way, then flew over his head. His handler was waiting at the bottom, but the eagle decided to take a sandwich from a man having lunch with his family. A fight for the sandwich ensued, the eagle won, leaving the man with cut fingers.

The eagle came up on the chairlift ahead of us, in the white container. Its sitting on the foream of the woman behind.

Eagle taking off. It flew down the piste between Alex and me.

And won the fight for the sandwich. The man in orange has fallen back clutching his cut fingers.

The handler eventually got the eagle under control.

At 6.15 pm on 15 February, the international space station passed directly over Meribel with a French astronaut aboard. 500 skiers with flaming torches formed a giant heart on the piste visible from the space station. We saw the lights in the distance, but didn’t find out what they were until later.

The next day we went up to the highest point on the mountains between Méribel and Courcheval. The Saulire is at 2738m and has spectacular views of the surrounding mountains, including Mont Blanc in the distance 63 km away. And then a thousand metre descent which the boys loved, and insisted on doing again the next day. To get to the top we skied to the bottom of the valley and caught this cablecar all the way up.

One of the boys starting the descent.